Mrs. Hobart felt hopeful when she parted with her husband. But she knew nothing of the real conflict going on in his mind between reason and awakened appetite--else had she trembled and grown faint in spirit. This conflict went on for some hours, when, alas! appetite conquered. At dinner time Mrs. Hobart saw at a glance how it was. The whole manner of her husband had changed. His state of depression was gone, and he exhibited an unnatural exhilaration of spirits. She needed not the sickening odor of his breath to tell the fatal secret that he had been unable to control himself. It was worse at night. He came home so much beside himself that he could with difficulty walk erectly. Half conscious of his condition, he did not attempt to join the family, but went up stairs and groped his way to bed. Mrs. Hobart did not follow him to his chamber. Heartsick, she retired to another room, and there wept bitterly for more than an hour. She was hopeless. Up from the melancholy past arose images of degradation and suffering too dreadful to contemplate. She felt that she had not strength to suffer again as she had suffered through many, many years. From this state she was aroused by groans from the room where her husband lay. Alarmed by the sounds, she instantly went to him. "What is the matter?" she asked, anxiously. "Oh! oh! I am in so much pain!" was groaned half inarticulately. "In pain, where?" "Oh! oh!" was repeated, in a tone of suffering; and then he commenced vomiting. Mrs. Hobart placed her hand upon his forehead and found it cold and clammy. Other and more painful symptoms followed. Before the doctor, who was immediately summoned, arrived, his whole system had become prostrate, and was fast sinking into a state of collapse. It was a decided case of cholera. "Has he been eating any thing improper?" asked Doctor L--, after administering such remedies, and ordering such treatment as he deemed the case required. "Has he eaten no green fruit?" "None." "Nothing, to my knowledge, replied Mrs. Hobart. "We have been very careful in regard to food." "Nor unripe vegetables?" Mrs. Hobart shook her head. "Nor fish?" "Nothing of the kind." "That is strange. He was well a few days ago." "Yes, perfectly, until he began to take a little brandy every day as a preventive." "Ah!" The doctor looked thoughtful. "But it couldn't have been that. I take a little pure brandy every day, and find it good. I recommend it to all my patients." Mrs. Hobart sighed. Then she asked--"Do you think him dangerous?" "I hope not. The attack is sudden and severe. But much worse cases recover. I will call round again before bed time." The doctor went away feeling far from comfortable. Only a few hours before he, had left a man sick with cholera beyond recovery, who had, to his certain knowledge, adopted the brandy-drinking-preventive-system but a week before; and that at his recommendation. And here was another case.